A. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to methods for allocating costs of a company. More particularly, the present invention relates to methods for allocating activity-based costs of a company using information provided by employees of the company.
B. Description of the Related Art
In today's marketplace, companies of all types strive to reduce costs while improving customer service. For example, insurance companies work to improve service to policyholders while reducing the costs associated with processing insurance claims. Insurance companies may also wish to reduce the time required to process claims or improve overall operating efficiency. To achieve its goals, a company can employ many business tools.
One such tool is an employee survey. A company can survey its employees to evaluate the company's performance. By understanding how employees spend their time, the company can determine the costs associated with specific tasks or activities performed by the employees. The company can use these cost determinations to develop and evaluate future plans for the company. For example, an insurance company could survey its claims handlers to determine the cost of processing a certain claim type.
To conduct an employee survey, a company can administer the survey itself or hire an outside firm to develop and administer the survey. Either way, a survey must be created and presented to the employees, and the employees' responses must be recorded and tallied. This can be done by distributing a paper survey to some or all of the employees, who complete and return the survey. Alternatively, designated survey-takers could sit down with each employee, read the questions to the employee, and record the employee's answers on the survey.
The utility of the survey results depends on the survey questions and the accuracy of employee responses. If the survey is too brief or worded poorly, the results may not be detailed enough to provide meaningful feedback to the company. Similarly, if taking the survey is difficult or time-consuming, it is likely that employees will give rushed or incomplete responses. It is therefore desirable to develop a method that provides flexibility in creating a survey and a user-friendly mechanism for administering the survey.